


A Drawn Sword (PG-13)

by WynCatastrophe



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rise of Empire Era - All Media Types, star wars intertrilogy
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-24
Updated: 2011-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-28 00:47:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/301905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WynCatastrophe/pseuds/WynCatastrophe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For <a href="http://veronicaprof.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://veronicaprof.livejournal.com/"><b>veronicaprof</b></a> , as partial fulfillment of a Vader/Palpatine story arc set late in the FFV or Gravityverse.  I think Palpatine and Vader fans in general might think it worth a look - so if that's you, read on! :) </p>
    </blockquote>





	A Drawn Sword (PG-13)

**Author's Note:**

> For [](http://veronicaprof.livejournal.com/profile)[ **veronicaprof**](http://veronicaprof.livejournal.com/) , as partial fulfillment of a Vader/Palpatine story arc set late in the FFV or Gravityverse.  I think Palpatine and Vader fans in general might think it worth a look - so if that's you, read on! :) 

  
 Disclaimer: George Lucas owns Star Wars.  This story is purely a work of fan fiction, and I am not making any profit from it.  

I'm still working on a title for the arc (open to suggestions, guys!), but I'm calling this first installment   _A Drawn Sword_.   That's a reference, and if you're feeling curious I'll tell you what it is (but I don't promise that you'll find it exciting). 

___________________  
  


Ryn had never liked Palpatine when he was the Republic’s Supreme Chancellor, and she didn’t like him any better now that he was an Emperor with –– as he would no doubt say himself –– unlimited power.  

 

His continual presence on the HoloNet –– the only source of news she was allowed, these days –– chafed her, dragging salt through the raw wounds that would never really heal ... but she endured, more or less.  

 

Some days maybe a little less. 

 

She shoved a strand of black hair back from her face - still growing out from where she’d shaved it to the scalp, in mourning for the love of her life, who had turned out to be not so dead after all.  That should have been good news, but sometimes she wondered.  Not for herself; she could never be sorry to have Anakin alive.  But for his own sake ... he was so unhappy now, so mired in the dark.  Always before, he had been her light.  Even the darkness within himself had been somehow wild and energetic, an ecstasy of destruction waiting to be released. Darth Vader is ... _sad_.  Melancholy.  _Beaten_ , and that hurts worse than anything.  

 

Sometimes Ryn wonders if Anakin Skywalker wouldn’t rather have chosen, for himself, to live free or die.  But with Padmé’s life on the line, he had risked these chains, risked everything he cared about and destroyed most of it.  

 

And for the first time in his life, the daring, desperate gamble hadn’t paid off.  The Chosen One had thrown himself at the mercy of Fate, and Fate had laughed and swept him away.  To Palpatine, to the Dark Side ... to misery and pain. The awful sense of _defeat_ that she can feel in him now, in those rare moments when they are together and not in crisis. 

 

 _Anakin, my Anakin, I’m so sorry, I couldn’t save you_ ... 

 

The one thing she’s sure of is that she should have been there.  Anakin should never have had to face those awful choices –– even now, she is dismally aware that she doesn’t know all of them –– alone.  

 

 _We failed him.  We let him die alone._  

 

[~]

 

She spends her days on Vjun now, skulking –– “remaining incognito,” Vader calls it; Ryn winces at the reminder that her brash young friend, with all his reckless honesty and wayward distaste for subterfuge, has learned the art of politic euphemisms –– in Bast Castle, frittering away her time on horticultural projects that never come to anything.  

 

It’s unimportant, except that it explains why she was there the day Lorth Needa showed up unannounced. 

 

[~]

 

Vader’s castle, unsurprisingly, did not present a welcoming aspect to uninvited visitors.  Lorth Needa shifted in his pilot’s chair, considering once again the wisdom (or unwisdom) of what he was doing.  There ought to be some other way ... but as before, he couldn’t think of any, and time was running out.  

 

He took a deep breath, reached for the com switch, and hit ON.  

 

Even the automated response machine sounded unfriendly.  _“Landing control,_ ” it intoned.  _“We are not accepting visitors at this time.  If you have a direct authorization code, please ––”_

 

Needa tapped in the code one-handed, holding his breath that his information was still good.  There was a pause, agonizing in its suspense, and then: _“Authorization code accepted.  Stand by for confirmation.”_

 

He stood by.  And stood by.  Fidgeted in his seat, wishing he dared risk a trip to the tiny ‘fresher unit –– all that waiting was hard on even the most well-trained bladder –– and stood by a little longer, still half-holding his breath.  

 

When the light finally flashed for INCOMING SIGNAL and he toggled the receiver to active status, he heard a real, human voice on the other line - humanoid, anyway.  Sometimes with Twi’Leks he couldn’t tell the difference unless they had a strong native accent. 

 

 _“Unidentified ship, we have received your authorization code,”_ the voice said: female and slightly husky, a surprise for one of Vader’s personal lackeys.  Rumor had it he never hired women at all.  

 

The thought surfaced, unworthy of an officer, of why Lord Vader might be willing to make an exception and pay a young-sounding woman to stick around his private residence. 

 

 _None of your business, Needa._   And it wasn’t, but that didn’t stop the reflexive curiosity that came from too many years of Fleet dinners and overly available officers’ wives.  All the sordid details of other being’s lives to which a captain was so often unavoidable privy.  

 

 _“Please activate viewscreen for visual confirmation,”_ the voice went on, instructing him with dispassionate professionalism, and Needa hit the series of switches as requested. 

 

 _“Thank you for complying.  Please lean forward into the viewing area.”_  

 

Needa did as he was told ... and then stopped, suddenly jolted by the reality looking back at him.

 

She was a little older, her hair a _lot_ shorter, and there was something indefinably different about the set of her mouth and eyes.  Maybe someone who hadn’t worked closely with her wouldn’t have seen it.  But Vader’s lackey, the husky-voiced female with the crisp Coruscanti diction and the precisely measured instructions, was unquestionably Areth’ryn Orun. Hero of the Republic.  Warlord of countless battles.  

 

Dead, before the Clone Wars ever ended. 

 

Except, apparently, not.  

 

“Wh –– I don’t ––” Needa took a deep breath and tried again.  “I am Captain Lorth Needa,” he said determinedly.  “I have an urgent message for Lord Vader.  I must request to speak with him immediately.” 

 

She hesitated, just a fraction of a second, and Needa wondered if that was doubt he saw in her eyes, or just a trick of the light.  _“Lord Vader is not here at this time,”_ she reported cautiously, her eyes wary on his face.  

 

 _Good to see you again, too,_ Needa thought, feeling unaccountably hurt by her refusal to acknowledge their acquaintance.  “I _must_ speak with him,” he reiterated, undeterred.  “If he is not there, then you know how to get in touch with him.  And this matter concerns his safety.” 

 

Orun’s face –– still impossibly beautiful, whatever the galaxy had done to her had left that much intact –– went very, very still.  _“His safety?”_ she repeated, sounding a little ... stunned, maybe.  As if she were reporting by rote, instead of really processing yet. 

 

  
_So maybe she really does care about him._   


 

More cynically: _Or maybe she’s in on it._  

 

But Orun was the one holding the big red button, so Needa had to trust her or give up entirely.  “Lord Vader’s life may be in danger,” he elaborated, trying to sound forceful instead of frightened.  “It cannot wait.” 

 

 _“No,”_ Orun said, still sounding a little mind-whacked.  Needa wondered uneasily whether Sith could do the same mind-tricks as they said the Jedi could, and what too many of those would do to you.  _“I can see that.  Proceed to the upper docking area.  I will meet you there.”_   She leaned a little closer to the viewer pickup, as though anxious to impress her words upon him.  _“Remain with your ship until I arrive.”_  

 

Needa took a deep breath.  “As you wish, m’lady.” 

 

He barely had time to register her startled look before the incoming signal cut off.  

 

 _Here goes nothing._  

 

[~]

 

“As you can see, Lord Vader, everything is proceeding as we had designed,” the Emperor reminded his silent apprentice –– half-chiding, half-encouraging; Palpatine didn’t know himself what tack to take, and that was as unnerving as any of the rest of it. Talking to Lord Vader was like talking to a droid these days; a particularly ill-programmed one, at that.  He would answer direct questions, carry out orders ... but almost never would he speak his own mind, about anything. 

 

Palpatine was beginning to wonder if he even _had_ one.  

 

It was only natural, in some ways, that the things which had most drawn him to his young apprentice would in their own time become the things which most threatened and frustrated him.  It was the essence of their relationship –– not just the Sith dyad, in this case, but _them_ : their particular, unique pairing of powers and personalities –– that the very things that had made Anakin Skywalker such an attractive –– eminently desirable –– conquest would make his reincarnation as a Sith a somewhat difficult apprentice to control: like a lightsaber, potent, deadly, and occasionally very challenging to wield.  Palpatine had accepted this necessity, had embraced it and all its significance.  Out of this struggle would be born the greatness of their legacy; already he could foresee it, almost _taste_ it.  He was ready for this; he had been born for it, bred for it, raised and trained and planned for it. 

 

But his currently difficulties with Lord Vader were something else instead. Where Palpatine had prepared to deal with recklessness, anger, and defiance, the Sith Lord before him was ... subdued.  Sullen. Withdrawn.  And while Anakin Skywalker had been inarticulate often, he had never been _silent_.  Getting Lord Vader to voice his thoughts was a challenge for which Palpatine had no answer, because ... well, because Vader always answered his questions.  Always politely.  But he never voiced Anakin’s ebullience, his unfettered enthusiasm for life, the galaxy, the Force itself.  He didn’t _volunteer_ anything. 

 

And Sidious hated it.  

 

“Are you pleased, my apprentice?” he asked now, carefully guarding his voice against an off-putting hint of displeasure. 

 

“Of course, my Master.” 

 

It was a perfectly acceptable answer.  

 

It made Sidious want to scream. 

 

 _Well, why don’t you?_  

 

But that was his own younger self, never so reckless as Anakin but certainly a bit wilder than his maturity.  And the reasons for delayed gratification, for (temporary) self-denial, had already been etched into the pattern of his life; Sidious was long used to the slow game, and he had made it his own.  

 

“Lord Vader, I trust you will not mind if I observe that your enthusiasm is somewhat ... underwhelming.” 

 

There was a pause while his apprentice processed this; but Anakin had been given to long pauses too, always eager to talk but never comfortable with parsing his thoughts into words, tools that came unwieldy to his hands.  Palpatine waited. 

 

“I apologize, Master.  I did not mean to slight your achievements.  The news is good, as you say.” 

 

Sidious gritted his teeth.  “I was not accusing you of anything, my young apprentice.  Merely commenting on your mood.  Are you well?” 

 

This inquiry was greeted with a further silence –– but a thoughtful one, as Lord Vader tilted his helmet slightly to one side and considered. 

 

“I am not ill,” he said at last.  “I feel ... unsettled, but I can discern no reason for it.” 

 

Sidious felt a prickle of disturbance himself.  Some new threat he had not anticipated?  “Lord Vader, such warnings from the Force are to be taken seriously.  You should have spoken to me of this before.” 

 

Vader bowed.  “I am sorry, my Master.” 

 

Such subservience was his due, and yet Palpatine found himself longing for the fiery young soul he had tempted with dreams of power. 

 

 _What a mess I have made of him.  And yet it could not be helped.  He is as great a milksop as a Sith as he was a firebrand to the Jedi._  

 

“Take a few days to yourself, Lord Vader.  Go to your retreat on Vjun and mediate.” 

 

“Yes, my Master.” 

 

 _And for Bane's sake, come back a little less flacid._  


End file.
